JB0

Ah, so that's where MAHQ got that idea. I need more books.

If I recall, zentradi/meltrandi is the race, zentran/meltran is the individual beings. Meltrandi isn't considered a seperate race outside of DYRL, though.

I'm pretty sure it's just MAHQ being Gundam-y. I can't think of any Macross "kai" mecha aside from Sound Force. 'Sides, it bears more resemblance to the QRau than the NosGer in the first place(in that there IS a visible relationship). So "Queadluun Rau Kai" is probably less inaccurate.

And many people would have been less happy, too.

I dunno if it's confirmed, but there's not much point if it's not a P38(or at least a close knockoff). If they make him something else... say, a Desert Eagle(big gun, easier to fit robot parts in), there's no nostalgia. He may as well be Gen2 Meggie.

Fans are apparently pretty fickle. Masterpiece Prime sucked because his truck wasn't accurate to a real truck, even though his 'bot was naer-perfect and his truck was fairly decent. And a bunch of people griped really loudly that the sacrifices to the truck were inexcusable. MP Starscream sucked because his robot wasn't wholely accurate to either the show or the toy, even though his jet was near-perfect(as toy jets go), and his 'bot was pretty decent. And a bunch of people griped really loudly that the sacrifices to the robot were inexcusable. Now Megatron's focusing on the robot like Prime did. And people are griping about the gun, before there's even prototype shots.

Oh, c'mon... you think they can pass up the opportunity to use the character-inappropriate, no, anatomically IMPOSSIBLE "These pretzels are making me thirsty"?

I've got G2 Prime, a (relatively mildly) abused Jetfire... but no 1/48. This will likely change when/if Yamato reissues Millia.

Y're welcome. And HELL YES! How about gun Megatron with a My Little Pony accessory/target dummy?

'S another bot I don't have. I have some guns that'll fit, though. Sludge's rocket launcher seems to use the exact same handle size as Hot Rod's flamethrower.

Indeed it was the point. But it was ALSO the point that you could rip in as a fighter, unload a swarm of missiles, flip to robot and drop down on someone gunpod blazing as the missiles flew in in a scene of supreme awesomeness and carnage. Can't do that here most of the time. I do agree it's heckuva fun a lot of the time. You can even kill Minmei by dropping a stadium on her!

Don't have Armada Prime. I've got G2, Powermaster, Classic, and Cybertron. I'm tempted to make a crappy photocomic of them arguing about which one's the "real" Prime. But it'd be crappy. I did notice his gun looked better if his arm was twisted around. But shoulder interference limits that to straight-arm poses. I waited years for transformers with joints, I'm not going back now. I enjoy the flame in auto mode. And by enjoy, I mean I keep going "nana nana BATMAN!" every time I look at it. In robot mode, I put the flame to the side. ... And debate drilling out the cross-shaped restrictor so I can load an old dinobot missile into it. It'd look better, even though it's too short to latch. They can tilt down, but they can't swing back while staying vertical. So there's a workaround, but not an optimum solution. And yah, for the price they kick ass.

The cel shading gives Battlecry a leg up on every non-sprite Macross game, aesthetically speaking. Battlecry tried to balance that by peppering ground missions about. Gravity makes the battroid useful, especially with the "roller-skate" foot thrusters. The problem THOSE ran into was that a lot of them were too crowded to use fighter mode(though I tried at just about every opening). I think it was at it's best in the non-urban ground stages. There was enough room to fly, but still enough level ground to run. The QRau duel in the not-really-a-lake was the showcase for that, IMO. You could pick any mode you wanted and make an effective combat strategy. Especially with the combination of rubble piles and tall columns scattered about. Flying the fighter between the columns was just too fun to NOT do. The groundless stages I usually stuck to fighter, and the urban areas were mainly battroid or GERWALK, depending on the situation.

If that's the one I think it is, it's the one where I wound up flying directly above the Cat's Eye doing nothing but dropping flares. My hatred of that stage knows no bounds.

Half the reason I bought Hot Rod was for the matrix tease, honestly. And Bumblebee's been tortured by Shockwave for quite some time over here. He kinda snapped, and now that he CAN hold guns, he's latched onto the biggest possible.

Honestly, if I were BB, I'd be worried about self-inflicted injury. Recoil on Powermaster Prime's rifles is probably pretty bad. And in the retake of that scene(which I may wind up using photobucket to post), Starscream and 'Bee both have one gun on Megs and one on each other. I <3 the backstabber. Edit: Gogo photobucket. Retake, part 1. Retake, part 2. Mainly because I couldn't let part 1 stand as-is. And this is why Hot Rod never shows up in these fights.

Added Hot Rod and Starscream to my collection. I now have all the Classic bots except Astrotrain, who really doesn't do much for me. And thus, I had to photograph a battle scene or 2. Edit:And the board is being beligerent. I never even hit submit since I couldn't get my files uploaded. Don't know what this post is here for. ... And now one shows up 1.5 times? ARGH!

Thoughts on Classic Megatron: He's too small. I was crushed to realize he wasn't sized properly for an adult to use the gun. Too much purple. I keep catching myself thinking "When did I get another Shockwave?" Too much neon green too, even though it's ALL in the wings. They desperately needed to apply some paint on the inside as well as outside. The gun needs flippable decepticon logos, or the ability to move on top of his arm. Having the logos hanging upside-down is lame. Overall, though, he's a pretty good design with an interesting transformation. And the presence of several prominent decepticon logos makes a strong character statement in a line where everyone else has no affiliation logo aside from a single rubsign.

My first thought on seeing the thumbnail was "Why is he photographing Shockwave?"

Plot isn't always the guiding principle behind game design. Case study: Asteroids. The LOGICAL thing to do would be to fly out of the asteroid field, not blow every rock in the universe up. I have no real objections to defensive missions, but Battlecry had too many very hostile ones. Less Cat's Eye, more celebrity Valkyrie plzkthx. ... Acutally, I wanted to see more Destroid Rage. But I'm a shameless destroid fanboy.

I disagree. Mode swap is to be loved. My advice: Screw flares. They're for escort missions. When she launches missiles, go to battroid and use secondary fire to shoot 'em down. Battroid is also good for getting turned around when she flies by you. Don't be afraid to take a few potshots at her with the battroid's primary fire, but don't really count on doing a lot with it. Lacking cover or gravity, battroid is a sitting duck, so don't stay in this mode. Personally, I found GERWALK... err, guardian... missiles to hit with far more dependability than fighter ones. But in space it still lacks the speed and agility of fighter mode. I say use fighter to move around, guardian to deal damage, and battroid for missile defense. The sooner you get rapid mode swaps down, the happier you'll be.

Well, the cockpit doesn't leak underwater...

Am I the only person that remembers BOTH versions as being Kawamori designed?

The saddest example of that in Macross is the VF-22 losing the flexible shape-changing wings of the YF-21. ... C'mon, those were awesome!

I'm fairly serious. That seems more or less how every episode went, though I admit my memories are more than a little fuzzy.